The joke is on you
by lululight
Summary: Fred and George's last year at Hogwarts. This is their version of the fifth book.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

Steam rolled form the scarlet engine as the Hogwarts express rolled away from platform nine and three quarters. Many children were hanging out of their windows the give there parents a last goodbye. Among them were two identical looking red haired boys, Fred and George Weasley. As they retreated laughing into their train compartment the atmosphere was just like it always was on the Hogwarts express…full of excitement. The twins sat down across from their friend Lee Jordon.

"So," said Lee. "I thought I wouldn't see you two back this year. Didn't you say that you didn't need a last year at Hogwarts?" He gave them a smug look. He knew precisely why they were going back.

"Well," started George trying not to give Lee the satisfaction of admitting it straight front, "We thought it might be good to test our marketing skills and, and of course, try out stuff on a few unsuspecting first years…"

"Oh please George, why don't you just tell him? It's perfectly obvious we came because of mum. Why don't you just say it?"

"Little twins afraid of mum? Ickle Fred and George scared of what mum would say?" he said in a mock Baby voice as he roared with laughter.

"No she's just got a lot on her plate right now." George said thinking of the Order of the Phoenix. "If we asked her now it would just turn into another row and we don't want that."

"What does she have on here plate?" asked lee curiously. The twins paused. Lee didn't know about the order.

"Well, we just mean that-" George paused and looked at Fred for help.

"Well, no one else believes Harry right? And Percy still sides with the ministry so she' all weepy about that." Fred finished with a wink at George. Lee looked satisfied.

"Oh yeah, of course, my mum wasn't even believing him in the beginning, but when I came home from school and told her that he was a great guy and not a nutter like the paper says she sided with him."They sat in an awkward silence. They all believed Harry but they knew that few other people did.

"So," said Fred breaking the silence, "Gryffindor needs some new players this year huh?" Both George and Lee seized the opportunity and began suggesting a new keeper. They talked on this subject for a long time until they were interrupted by the sweet old lady pushing the sweet cart. She gave them a sugary smile when she saw who was in the compartment.

"Would you like something sweet dears?" The effect of her words was immediate. Both Fred and George leaped up from their seats.

"How do you do it?" Fred exclaimed as he gave her a low bow.

"How do I do what?" she said with a blushing smile. The twins were always trying to flatter her.

"Look younger every time we see you?" George said as he kissed her hand.

"Oh you two!" The cart lady exclaimed." You are always just trying to flatter me. I know you don't mean a word you say," she spoke as if she were scolding them but a smile was forming on her lips. "Well, I guess I should thank you anyway. You always make me feel happy, here, take a chocolate frog, on the house."

"Oh no." exclaimed George. "We couldn't.'

"We couldn't," echoed Fred, "We just couldn't."

"Oh take them, you two are so sweet." She smiled and moved on to the next compartment. Fred and George settled down into to their seats unwrapping their frogs with grins on their faces.

"I'm going to miss that lady." George said as he looked at his card. It was Bertie Bott; the creator of Bertie Bott's every flavor beans. "She is always a laugh; remember when she gave us a licorice wand for changing that mouthy first year's hair blue when he tried to steal a pumpkin patsy? George nodded.

"Stupid git had it coming to him." Fred looked out the window. He could just barely see the tip of the astrology tower in the distance. "There it is good old Hogwarts." He gazed out the window with a bit of nostalgic. He was going to miss Hogwarts, but another though came to him and slowly an evil grin spread across his face.

"What are you thinking?" His twin said.

"Oh I was just thinking, you know it is our last year at Hogwarts. It would seem silly to leave without a bang."

"Actually I was thinking more along the lines of sonic boom." He smiled. "Let the games begin."


	2. Chapter 2

Normally the beginning of the school year feast was a happy, care-free affair. There was no homework, no projects, and no problems to stress anyone out just yet. Summer had just ended and school had yet to begin. There had never been anything to really worry about at the first year of the school year.

This year was different though. Their normal routine of Dumbledore's short speech before the feast that simply said to eat up and that a larger speech will come later had been demolished. This year their new teacher for Defense Against the Dark Arts had chosen to interrupt Dumbledore. She had given a long speech that only a select few (mainly Hermione) listened to. So instead of the happy go lucky feast that they were used too, there was a different atmosphere. While everyone was still happy and carefree there seemed to be a certain amount of uneasiness. No one had really listened to the speech but they still didn't know what quite to think of it.

"So," George started, "what's up with that Umbridge lady?" He looked at Lee and Fred. Fred shrugged.

"She just sounds like a boring old hag to me. Though I don't think she will be smiling much longer if she keeps interrupting Dumbledore." He smiled as if he was already imagining it. "No doubt she'll her lesson soon enough."

"I don't know," Lee sounded unsure. "I think there's something underneath. Why else would she act so sweet? Maybe she said something important in that speech. Man, that thing was boring."

"I know," said Fred with mock exhaustion, "that wore me out, I mean, she could rival Binns." Lee and George laughed. Binns was the most boring teacher in the whole school.

The feast was ended up being enjoyable even with the beginning speech. Lee George and Fred filled themselves with all of their favorites and laughter erupted form the table when Fred and George held a heated sword fight with a carrot and a turkey drumstick.

"Stand and fight you scurvy cur!" Yelled George in a good imitation of the painting Sir Cadogen as her brandished his drumstick at Fred.

"You'll never win! Not as long as I have breath in my body and a carrot to fight with!" He promptly swung his carrot in a high arc and brought it swishing down, where it broke on George's drumstick. Both of the twins burst out laughing with everyone else around them. Still smiling as the laughter died down they continued eating.

Once the feast was over and Dumbledore had given his typical speech they headed off to bed. Fred, George, and Lee trudged up to the room that had been their second home for six years now. They shared their dormitory with two other boys, Jeffery Collins and Stanley Williams. Jeffery was a tall and black- haired. He got along with everyone in the dormitory fairly well. He was quite brainy which became annoying at times. Stan was a pretty decent guy too. He was a bit of a stickler for rules but he knew better than to get onto the Weasley twins by now. After six years of living in the same room with the biggest trouble makers in the school he had loosened up a bit on his value for rules. He greeted them when they came in.

"Hey guys! Good summer?" He gave them a smile.

"Decent, nothing too exciting." George replied with a wink at Fred. Fred winked back. In truth living in the middle of a secret organization dedicated to the destruction of the most powerful dark wizard of all time hadn't been too exciting ever since they got caught eavesdropping. "And you?"

"Can't complain, I came of age so, you know, I was allowed to use magic at home now and my parents are muggle born so that was interesting." He gave a grin as everyone laughed. Fred looked at Stan.

"What about you Stan? How was summer?" Stan looked up slightly startled.

"Fine." He quickly went back to rummaging around in his trunk. He glanced at Fred and George with a strange look.

The boys got into their beds and Stan, being the last one up flicked his wand at the candle which promptly went out. Slowly one by one snores and the deep even breathing of sleep filled the room. The only ones left awake were the two red-headed twins.

"So," whispered Fred. "Have you thought of it yet? What's going to be our 'sonic boom'?"

"I don't know." A slow evil grin spread across his face. "But it's going to be spectacular." Even in the dark he knew that his twin's smile matched his own. They were definitely going to go all out this year.


	3. Chapter 3

As the sun rose for the first day of school there was a general grumbling as the boys rolled out of bed. They had not had to wake up early for school all summer. No one talked. They all dressed in a grumpy sort of silence. Soon everyone was out of the dormitory except for the twins. George was up and almost dressed but Fred was still sound asleep. George knew he would have to wake him up... As he walked over to Fred's bed he pulled out his wand and pointed it at Fred's face.

"Aguamenti." He muttered under his breath. A gush of cold water shot out of his wand and splashed Fred's face.

"What the?" he sputtered and looked up at George who was shaking with laughter. "You didn't have to do that." He said grumpily as he siphoned water off of himself and his bed sheets. "You could have just given me a shake or…" George cut him off.

"Would you have given me a 'shake' if it had been me laying there all vulnerable and defenseless?"

"No I guess not." Fred answered as a slow grin crossed his face.

After a quick breakfast of bacon and toast they headed to their first class, Herbology. As they hurried down to the green houses they heard an excited murmur from their class. Upon reaching the green house they understood why. On the tables were what looked to be about fifteen ferns except they weren't ferns, not regular ones at least, they looked like they were made of solid gold. Professor Sprout looked happy about the amount of attention her plants were getting.

"These are Contriffor plants. They are known for their healing properties. We will be trimming them to today. Madam Pomphrey is running low on Contriffor leaves so I thought this would make a good first day project." She went to demonstrate the correct way to cut the leaves and how the fold them. After several minutes they were all cutting and folding leaves. Fred looked at George with a questioning look. He nodded to the rapidly filling basket of leaves. George immediately got the message and nodded. Being as careful as he could he subtly pushed a few folded leaves into his pocket. It sounded like just the substance they needed for one of their skiving snack boxes. Maybe they would finally perfect their fever fudge

It had been a relatively good morning. Herbology had been easy and Transfiguration had just been a long talk about what to expect on their N.E.W.T. tests. Fred and George had ignored this long talk and spent the time playing hang man. Fred won after George hung his little stick figure on the phrase 'Snape is a greasy-haired git.'

"Ah, I should've had that one; it was so obvious." George said with mock indignation.

"Don't beat yourself up, I mean, there are some many insults to choose from it." They both laughed and headed to lunch. Sitting at table they piled their plates with chicken and potatoes. George pulled out his schedule. Fred leaned over to look.

"What's next?" He asked as he took a bite of chicken.

"Well, we have charms, then we have Defense against the Dark Arts with that boring old hag Umbridge. Guess we will be able to see what's she's like. You know I reckon Lee's right about her. She gives me the creeps." He put his schedule away and began eating his chicken too.

"Did you put up the sign?" asked George thickly through the mashed potatoes he was eating.

"Yup. We'll just have to wait and see." Fred had set up the sign advertising their need for testers. They didn't say testers of course; they just said it was good way to make money, which usually got people interested. George hadn't really been on lying on the train about testing things on innocent underclassmen. They figured if the just glazed over the risk in the job description and gave them enough galleons they would have several people signed up before they knew it.

Charms went as expected. They got another speech about N.E.W.T. tests. Fred and George were starting to feel like it was O.W.L. year all over again which didn't make them too happy. In a stressed out atmosphere jokes weren't taken well and that put a major damper on their fun. They were expecting another long talk about N.E.W.T. s in Defense against the Dark Arts and they were right. Professor Umbridge immediately started into what was sure to be a long talk about N.E.W.T.s.

"I just thought that I should inform you that seventh year is the year that you take your N.E.W.T. tests because I am sure that there are some of you that weren't aware of that fact."

"Yeah," whispered Fred, "because some people live in closets." Lee and George had to work hard to keep straight faces.

"Is there something you wanted to say Mr. Weasley?" asked Professor Umbridge in her sugary sweet voice.

"Why no," said George pretending that she was talking to him not Fred, "what gave you that idea?" Mrs. Umbridge frowned.

"I was talking about the other Mr. Weasley."

"But which one?" George continued. "Ron's in another class, Charlie's in Romania, Dad's at work…"

"Ten points form Gryffindor Mr. Weasley, you humor had no place in my classroom." She gave a satisfied smile. "If you keep going you will end up in detention like Mr. Potter did in my last class."

"Harry got detention?" Angelina asked angrily.

"Oh yes, I gave him a whole weeks worth," her sugary smile widened, "for spreading nasty attention-seeking lies."

Angelina looked livid. Fred and George gave each other a grim look. Harry wouldn't be able to go to quiddich tryouts and Angelina was obviously not happy.

The rest of the class passed by like every other boring class. Fred and George went to dinner. They weren't surprised to see Angelina screaming at Harry. Fred shook his head as he watched them.

"Umbridge is a pretty nasty piece of work isn't she? 'Nasty attention-seeking lies', 'your humor has no place in my classroom'? That sounds a bit harsh. It's one thing to share your opinion. It's another to give out detention for it."

"Yeah," agreed George. "She doesn't have a sense of humor either. Plus she acted as if practicing magic was stupid. What a cow! You know what I think?" Fred smiled as if he had seen it coming.

"We just found our poor subject for the sonic boom?"

"Precisely."


	4. Chapter 4

_Hi, just a word from the writer. Thank you for reading my story, I am honored that someone even wanted to read it. This is my first fanfic so I am definitely open to what people think and I would love hear what you think about this story. Thanks for the reviews it was nice to hear what you thought. Again thank you for reading, I hope you enjoy it. So…now on with the show!_

The next day went similarly like the first. they were bored by long speeches about N.E.W.T tests and were either given difficult homework or long review assignments. The twins already were not liking seventh year.

George's prediction about the sign had definitely came true. As soon as they reached the breakfast table two kids came up to them. One was a black-haired first year who looked nervous and the other was a tall brown-haired second year who seemed to be dragging the first year along with him.

"We would like to ask you about your ad on the bullinten board," stated the second year boldly.

"Ah yes!" said George as he whipped out a small notebook form his pocket. "If you would just sign here." He set the note book in front of them. They signed quickly. "We will notify when our testing will be. You will each receive a galleon per testing. Thank you."He quickly put the notebook away as if nothing had happened.

After a nice dinner of lamb chops and salad (Fred had a little too much fun playing with his tomato and tried to make it stick to his nose but instead it squirted juice in his eye) the twins headed up to their dormitory to get their broomsticks for practice. Stan was looking through his trunk in search of 

something. They were not surprised to find Jeff working busily on his assignments while sitting on his bed. He refused to work in the common room claiming it was too noisy. The twins rummaged around their trunks looking for their brooms. After finding them they were about to leave when Fred held up a hat.

"Is this yours Jeff? It was under my bed."

"Oh, yeah, I was looking for that." He reached out and was about to grab it but stopped half way through. He looked suddenly skeptical. "What did you do to it?" He demanded. Fred looked perfectly innocent.

"Do? I haven't done anything too it."He smiled. Jeff didn't look convinced.

"It's not going to make my head disappear when I put it on or anything?" He took the hat aprehnsively.

"Make your head disappear? No, that's good though, really good."

"Yeah," interrupted George. "We will have to look into that. Disappearing head hat… sounds catchy." Stan groaned at his words.

"Look what you started Jeff." He said looking at the twins with a mixture of exasperation and amusement. "Now they're going to have to experiment and there will be explosions, and fires, and-" he was cut off by Jeff who had given a yell when the hat turned his hair blue.

"You said you didn't do anything to it." Jeff yelled. Everyone roared with laughter at him.

"I only said I didn't do anything to it and I didn't lie. George was the one that hexed it." With that they left Jeff cursing as he tried to dye his hair back.

It was almost time for quidditch tryouts. Fred and George went out early to survey the group of people trying out for keeper. Entering the stadium they saw them, a group of people all in varying stages of nervousness. Fred and George immediately began discussing which ones looked like they would rise to the challenge and which ones they thought would barely make it off the ground. They were just deciding that a tall blond-haired boy looked promising when George caught sight of a tuft of red hair.

"What the hell?" He muttered and turned his head to get a good look. He shook his head. He couldn't believe it. Why would he be trying out? He nudged Fred.

"Is that who I think it is?" He asked pointing at the red-haired kid in the back. Fred shook his head disbelievingly.

"No," he whispered. "It couldn't be." But it was. Ron was trying out for keeper.


	5. Chapter 5

Fred and George were shocked. Ron had somehow managed to become keeper. Ron had never seemed like the coordinated type but they had to admit he had flown pretty well, there were some others who had flown better but when they asked Angelina about she picked Ron over them she simply said that she had her reasons which sounded to the twins that they were just gits who wouldn't do well on a team. They were happy for their brother but still hadn't quite forgiven him for becoming a prefect. He had always seemed alright, laughing at everything, disregarding the rules, it had seemed that they had been training their brother to follow in their footsteps until he received that prefect badge. They hadn't fully given up hope though. Maybe quidditch practice could loosen him up.

The week passed on without too many problems, well, there were plenty of problems but problems were normal at Hogwarts. Neville had managed to melt yet another cauldron . Lee had somehow managed to not transform his wineglass into a metal cup like Professor Mcgonagal had asked but caused it to start smoking and emit a high pitched whine. And last but certainly not least the twins had successfully substituted Warrington's(the slytheran quidditch captain) knot grass for lith moss in potions causing his potion to explode.

Friday came around and the twins' testing flyers had received a lot of attention. Sadly though they were receiving too much attention. Friday evening they were approached by Hermione. To tell the truth they had been expecting this. They knew that now that she was a prefect she would definitely be getting onto their questionable methods of testing their products. So when she came up to them in the common room they were perfectly prepared.

"What, is this?" Hermione asked her voice full of accusation. "You cannot post things advertising for testers."

" It's all voluntary Hermione and we're paying them." George argued. He knew that they were going to win this fight. She had no case against them.

"We have already tested them on ourselves. It's not like we are handing them dangerous substances." Fred added.

"Ron and I think that what you're doing could be dangerous." Hermione continued indignantly.

"Ron? If he thinks that then where is he?" Fred said with a smile. Hermione looked behind as if she had thought that Ron had been behind her. She looked angry to see him at a table with Harry. He gave an embarrassed smile and waved. Hemione gave an exasperated sound and stormed off. George smiled.

"Looks like Ron is in for it isn't he?" he said. Fred laughed.

"Oh yeah, he is going to get it. You know, maybe we were wrong to judge, for a prefect he is certainly living up to our expectations." He trailed off now smiling as they watched Hermione having a few very angry words with Ron.

With the weekend upon them Fred and George decided that they should get back to inventing again. They were excited to try their new ingredient in Fever Fudge and they had a few general basic spell combinations they wanted to try for a head disappearing hat.

An hour later the twins sat together on Fred's bed. George was clutching a hat in his hands as Fred whispered and tapped it with his wand. He raised his wand to complete the final spell and that was when the hat exploded. They both gave a muffled yell and ducked for cover. Their reflexes had gotten good after years of experience. Peering over the side of the bed George eyed the hat warily. He wanted to make sure that it was done. When he looked satisfied he slowly got to his feet.

"It's alright, it's done."George called. Fred crawled out from under the bed and looked at the smoldering hat.

"Do you think that we over did it a bit?" Fred asked poking the hat. A few ashes fell off.

"Yeah, a bit, maybe next time we should tone it down." He carefully picked up the hat but it emitted another bang, they both dived under the bed again. After a few seconds they heard footsteps.

"What was that? What are you two making this time." Ron's feet soon became visible under the bed. The twins slowly crawled out.

"It's an experiment and it's going rather well for our first try."George said. Ron laughed.

"A giant explosion that singed your eyebrows off is good? I'd hate to see bad."


	6. Chapter 6

It had been a bad week for Fred and George. Hermione had been on their case again, Harry was always in trouble with Umbridge, and Ron was suffering badly in quidditch. They had managed to dodge Hermione. It hadn't been hard. George was actually beginning to believe that she might actually have a rule-breaking side to her but Fred absolutely disagreed. Hermione to him was a fixed rule- follower and that wouldn't change. As for Harry, there was nothing they could do about that but hope Umbridge would turn into a dingbat…that wasn't likely. Then there was the problem about Ron.

Ron could sometimes perform in an extrodinary way on his broomstick but was prone to nervousness. They had toyed with the idea of slipping him something to sooth his nerves but despite their rule-breaking ways they just couldn't do it. Quidditch had always been somewhat of a sacred thing to them that should not be broken. It was against the rules to aide players with potions and they weren't about to break that rule. It was a tough thing to do. Ron was becoming a major subject of their frustration as he made blunders and fumbled the ball but yet he was still their brother and they still wanted the best for them.

There was also the problem of their NEWT tests. They didn't plan on actually needing the test but if they just slacked off on their work and gave up they would have to deal with not only the teachers but their dear old mum as well. That was something they both agreed on avoiding. So even though it was turning into a nice day outside Fred and George found themselves regetably in the edge of the common room trying to make their way through the large amount of homework that Snape had decided to give them the day before. They had been trying to get through a set of questions about the uses of slow-acting venoms in potions but were sadly stuck on the last question.

"What is widely acknowledged as the most helpful worldwide use of slow-acting venoms in medicine?" George read the question out loud for the fifth time hoping that somehow hearing once more could maybe spark some sort of understanding in his mind. Fred was frantically flipping through the five pages devoted in their potions book to slow-acting venoms.

"It's not here. It's just not here." He skimmed the writing on a page with a picture of three healers attending to a patient who appeared to have something wrong with his hand. The picture was moving of course. The first healer was mixing something in a bowl and which the two healers took from him and applied it the hand of the patient, an old woman, and tapped it with his wand. "Yeah, right here they talk about slow-acting venoms being great for curing all sorts of things but they don't really tell which one is the…" He never got to finish his sentence. Hermione had walking up to their corner and she looked mad. Had she heard about their testing yesterday? Fred couldn't think of anything that she could get angry about. The testing had gone well. There were no side effects of the puking pastel. It was finally complete.

"What are you two up to?" she looked suspiciously at the papers in front of them.

"Homework," replied George with a look of frustration. She didn't seem to ever leave them alone did she? "It's not illegal now is it?"

"How stupid do you think I look?" she tossed her bushy hair with exasperation.

"Well, a great deal more than you usually do. Is there honestly nothing better to do than pick on us?" He tossed his hair in an imitation of Hermione. She was about to retaliate when George thrust his paper in her face. She quickly swallowed her words and sank into a chair staring at the paper.

"I'm sorry." She whispered.

"Yeah, you should be," said Fred moodily. He went opened his book and began searching with Fred.

"No, I don't mean just about this. I mean. It's just you know. All this stuff is going on and, well, I guess I took it out on you a little bit." She looked at them and suddenly burst out crying. Fred jumped at her sudden outburst. George didn't quite know what to do, so he patted her awkwardly on the shoulder. This was unexpected. "I'm sorry," she gasped between sobs. "It's just, Harry's always in trouble and Ron is always having problems with that stupid game, and I think I'm going to fail my OWLs." She continued sobbing. Fred looked at George. Fred had never been very good in situations like this. George wasn't much better either but he was a better candidate for it. He sighed and tried to think.

"Oh, Hermione," He paused trying to think of something to say. "Things will turn out. It's only a matter of time before the whole Harry thing will be smoothed over. People will believe him eventually. Ron is doing better at quidditch. He'll pull through. As for you." He sounded more confident at this part. Until now he had been making stuff up hoping it would come true but there was one thing he could be sure of. "I know that you will do absolutely bloody awesome at your OWLs. You'll be making all those brainiac Ravenclaws jealous." She paused.

"Are you sure?" Her sobs were slowly subsiding. George knew he had done the trick. Fred let out a sigh of relief. People being so unhappy sometimes made him nervous.

"Of course! I know lots of people who wish they had your brains. Myself included. I mean, here I am seventh year, and I have been looking twenty minutes for the most helpful worldwide use of slow-acting venoms in medicine…"

"Cancer removal." Hermione whispered. George paused. He had meant it as a rhetorical question but this was even better.

"See? You are younger than me and you already know. How brilliant is that?" He smiled and patter her should while descretly writing down the answer on his sheet. Fred took advantage of her sudden halt to tears.

"Now, how about you take a…" Fred rummaged around in his pockets. "Tickling sweet." He held out a small pink and yellow swirled hard candy. Hermione shot him a suspicious look. Fred put a look of mock offense on his face.

"First you accuse us of not doing our precious homework and now you think we would take advantage of a meek crying girl? Who do you take us for? Sytherins?" she smiled at the always welcome Sytherin joke and took the sweet. She carefully unwrapped it and popped it in her mouth. Her eyes went round with surprise and she spat it out. A giggle escaped.

"That tickles!" She let out a shout of laughter.

"Of course it does! Why else would we call it a tickling sweet?" George smiled. Hermione popped it back into her mouth and giggled some more. Her tears had long disappeared. George looked to Fred.

"Well Fred I think our work here is done."

"Right you are George." They suddenly stood up and went to their dormitory, leaving the newly happy and laughing Hermione behind.

"That was not only unexpected but very odd." George muttered to Fred as soon as they got out of earshot.

"I know! I thought she went metal or something. First she went all prefect on us and then she was bawling. I mean how does she do that?"

"I don't know but I do know one thing." They had arrived in their dormitory and George was inspecting something on the table.

"What?" Fred twisted around to see what he was looking at.

"The new fever fudge is ready."


End file.
